In November, 1996 I was in Kathmandu, sitting cross-legged amongst an assembly of multinationals, listening to an Australian monk lecture us on the meaning of compassion in Tibetan Buddhism. He held up high an orange sheet of paper for us all to see, then turned it around - we could now see it was white on the back.

Then he turned the orange side to face us all again and asked: “Who can imagine what the back colour of this orange sheet is?”

“White!” we all yelled back.

“This,” he solemnly declared “is a unique human characteristic. It is how we are able to develop compassion for others.”

I am not sure if this is true, but nonetheless I always remembered this simple, elegant description of empathy: our ability to imagine the experience another person is having.

Empathy is not sympathy. Sympathy is all about feeling sorry for a person, and separating your Self from them. Empathy is the opposite of that. Empathy involves getting behind a person’s eyeballs, and seeing how they are seeing. This is the basis of compassion our monk was teaching us, and it also the basis of successful marketing and selling.

So what experience does a student have getting to you?

Imagine it, imagine being them and facing your process. How many steps does it involve? At the most? At the least? At BodyChance, here’s how it looks if we were courting you:

1. Gathering
We want you to see and listen to us.
We capture your attention through SEO optimization of our website for Alexander Technique, and other keywords, through social media outreach (Facebook, Twitter etc.), through articles in newspapers, through blogs and word of mouth, through Google adds, advertising, Directory listings, website links, visits to other studios…
Any. Way. We. Can.

2. Engagement
We want to talk to you about you.
In this stage we engage you - you will Like our Facebook page, read our twitters, join our MailMag. Then we invite you to other lists, other email seminars. There are steps within steps, but the aim is to get you to register into one or more of our lists.
How does this work for your prospective students?

3. Contact
We want to meet you.
For this we invite you to attend an Introduction, a 1Day workshop, an online learning course, an Event, residential or even a party. This is about a “Dear Sato-san” personalized email in acknowledgment of a step you have taken towards us. There are steps within steps, but the aim is to meet you personally in virtual or real space.
What would this look like in your practice?

4. Encouragement
We want to talk about your future with us.
Once you have paid any money for anything, you get added into a different mailing list. We have various approaches depending on how originally joined, but there’s plenty of scope yet for development. There are steps within steps, but the aim is to enrol you in a continuity program - whether live or online - on a monthly basis.
Are you combining this step with the previous one?

5. Enrolment
We invite you to go deeper.
We have interviews, interventions, surveys, methods to ensure you are content, methods to reconnect with your needs, suggestions to develop your involvement. There are steps within steps, but the aim is to increase your commitment to learning by going deeper in some way.
Do you have a back end to invite people to join?

Using my headings as a rough guide - create a document which details your current Student Funnel. Once you have written it, upload to the Files Section of ATSuccess in Facebook by choosing the Files tab when in our Facebook group.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ATCSProMembers/files/